A quick poem.
I begin to formulate, forming a string of thoughts
I put together a sentence I'm fond of.
I ponder, smile and then light the thought on fire.
The string, now more of a fuse, consumed by the flame, shortens
The string burns getting closer to the bomb, my poem, the sweater from which my thought was pulled.
I close my eyes and cover my face expecting a bang.
I flinch and must look utterly insane for there is no bang, no pop, no explosion.
Nothing.
I must have been mistaken, like I am now, as I sit striving to unravel a sweater by only staring.

Some days I think I need nothing
more in life than a spoon.
With a spoon I can eat oatmeal,
or take the medicine doctors prescribe.
I can swat a fly sleeping on the sill
or pound the table to get attention.
I can point accusingly at God
or stab the empty air repeatedly.
Looking into the spoon's mirror,
I can study my small face in its shiny bowl,
or cover one eye to make half the world
disappear. With a spoon
I can dig a tunnel to freedom,
spoonful by spoonful of dirt,
or waste life catching moonlight
and flinging it into the blackest night.

My wife, a psychiatrist, sleeps
through my reading and writing in bed,
the half-whispered lines,
manuscripts piled between us,

but in the deep part of night
when her beeper sounds
she bolts awake to return the page
of a patient afraid he'll **** himself.

She sits in her robe in the kitchen,
listening to the anguished voice
on the phone. She becomes
the vessel that contains his fear,

someone he can trust to tell
things I would tell to a poem.

How I adore your nerve
when you kissed me in your closet upon sheets made of legos
and all of your childhood dreams.
How easy I am for you to draw when you play on stage the song that you wrote me,
The one that feels like rock climbing by the river,
Like naps in the summer when I drool on your chest and you don't mind,
Like kissing you until the very last minute of my curfew,
only to break it for the miracle that is your lips.
How alluring is your breath on my neck,
Your voice in my ear when you told me that you loved me
and you didn't stop smiling,
even as the years went by and I did.
How I craved, longed, begged for time to be still
the time you took me to the highest hill you could drive to,
You called it my mountain.
"At first, you look at it and it's so small,
but once you notice it, it's all you can see," you said.
How my stomach floods with waves of nostalgia and a taste
of everything I've ever had to live without,
With complete and utter spell-binded devotion at the simple familiarity
of your smell.
How addicted I am to your laugh when you're happy and
the mastered impression you do of your mom.
How weak I am to your intellect and your appreciation of literature
and real music,
Your enthusiasm for art and the "name that note" game you force upon me
as you stumble onto the classical radio station.
How in love I am with your romance that is as childish as my attachment
to my baby blankie and my mother's childhood walrus that you never ceased to insult.
Our pajama day that we decided over our prom,
When we turned on John Mayer and slow danced in your room.
Your idea of a date consisted of fake wine and me.
How incredibly warm are the coldest of nights,
On the side of your dirt road as we lie in the snow that is too cold for comfort,
yet holds us there with the fear that one day will not look the same as this one
and I would bear any amount of cold winter to keep one more moment of yours.
How I cherish the way you latch my pinky with yours when we walk
And the face you don't know you make when you play guitar.
The rooftop where you kissed me for the very first time and the string rings
we wore to remind each other we were still there.
How incredibly and unfortunately devout I am to all that I remember of you.

tell me where you found God
I don't want the name of some church you went to
I want a detailed story of a brilliant burst of light
or that time you heard a voice in the dark
I want to know your details
I am fascinated with man
and higher beings
and the fact that it has to be real if I see it
if I believe it
tell me where you found Angels
doesn't matter if it was in a hospital room
or a highway
did you feel hands on your shoulders?
think in lights
and see in patterns
I want to know where you found safety
I found mine in a low voice telling me that the angels
were real
and how tragic it is to not believe in anything
and to also believe in everything

I was late to school once
reading a story about a heroine addict
who found the closest thing to God
in a little girl
talking to a wall
I thought about it
for so long

I missed 7 am

I want to miss 8 am
or 9 am
thinking about your story
of how you found
safety
finally
tell me,
where did you find God?

You might put the past behind you,
but even when the sun is on your back
you can still feel it's heat.

If I had a penny for every single time you crossed my mind,
well, I would have gold bleeding out of my pores,
and every step I take would leave behind
a footprint made of diamonds.

With the wealth of the world,
I would be able to visit the stars every single night;
maybe even build a castle at the centre of the universe
just for us.

But darling,
I'd trade it all
if it meant you'd throw away your pride
and hold my hand one last time.

- g.d.

I read that he lost a suitcase full of manuscripts on a
train and that they never were recovered.
I can't match the agony of this
but the other night I wrote a 3-page poem
upon this computer
and through my lack of diligence and
practice
and by playing around with commands
on the menu
I somehow managed to erase the poem
forever.
believe me, such a thing is difficult to do
even for a novice
but I somehow managed to do
it.

now I don't think this 3-pager was immor-
tal
but there were some crazy wild lines,
now gone forever.
it bothers more than a touch, it's some-
thing like knocking over a good bottle of
wine.

and writing about it hardly makes a good
poem.
still, I thought somehow you'd like to
know?

if not, at least you've read this far
and there could be better work
down the line.

let's hope so, for your sake
and
mine.